My friend just returned from a cruise and asked me if I new why every cruise that he knew of would always stop in at least one foreign port.
He first thought that this was just a feature of finding neat places to stop, but soon realized that Hawaiian cruises will also add one foreign port.
Anybody know if there is a legality that sets this rule?
That’s a result of the 1920 Jones Act, which requires that all shipping within US waters be done on US-owned ships, with US crews, and in US-built hulls. The quick jaunt outside US waters eliminates what would be a crippling restriction, since nearly all cruise lines miss at least one of those criteria.
Some examples: Virtually all Alaska cruises operate from Vancouver, not Seattle. Trips from California to Hawaii involve a visit to Ensenada, Mexico. Cruises around Hawaii involve a visit to fascinating Fanning Island, although not the ones proposed by Holland-America lines with the refitted hulk of the S.S. United States. Cruises from New York to New England always stop in Canada.
It isn’t just cruises that are affected, of course. From the first linked story:
As long as the seaman’s unions resist repeal, it isn’t going to get repealed.
Cruises which stop exclusively in U.S. ports of call are governed by the Jones Act. That means a US-built ship, American crew, and all sorts of other stuff. You couldn’t afford a cruise on a Jones Act vessel – the capital and operating costs would just be too high for the company to price competitively.
Stop even briefly in a foreign port of call and you get to register your ship in the Bahamas or Liberia, have the vessel built in a state-subsidized shipyard in France or Korea and have Phillipinos working below decks.
There are some Hawaii-only cruise lines, or were a few years back. I’m led to understand they’re slowly going bankrupt.
Which is to say, what Elvis said.
American Hawaii Cruises folded in 2001, one of their 2 worn-out ships is mothballed and the other sank on the way to the scrapyard.
History. No Hawaii-only cruises are currently available.
Ah, bummer. I wasn’t aware they had finally drydocked the Independence. Poor Sam Zell.
That said, Norwegian Cruise Lines offers Hawaii-only cruises on a foreign ship which has “temporary” Jones Act certification while they wait for someone to dig the Pride of America off the bottom of that German harbor.
Thank you both for fighting ignorance one Bubbadog at a time. 
So what was the Jones Act intended to do? The Farm Bureau article cited above doesn’t really explain what it’s intended effect was, only what consequences it has. What benefits are there to the Jones Act?
And the ones that do leave from Seattle make a stop in Victoria or Vancouver.
It was intended to protect US shipping and shipbuilders from foreign competition.